Catie and Javier

How We Met

Catie and myself live in Gluckstadt, MS. Nice quiet area in between Madison and Canton. Nice place to raise a family. Which is exactly what we are. We have 2 beautiful children, Brody(6) and Sofia(10mo.). We both work at the same hospital in Jackson. Catie works as registered nurse in the emergency room. I work in radiology for the CT department. And this is how our paths crossed. Starting around probably Fall of 2015, we started seeing each other more often at work because I was working in the ER, doing scans or “cat” scans. So we started seeing each other more often. Working in the same area with the same people, you become friends with most but there was always something different about her. Just the way she would smile at me and her eyes would light up a bit more. She would always have that sparkle in her eye when she looked at me. I noticed it way back then. But we didn’t go on our first date until Nov. 18, 2016. Mainly because we were so different in so many ways. But that spark between us was always there and it couldn’t be ignored. So we went out for pizza and beer and immediately discovered our common love for Bill Withers, Sam Cooke, and all our favorite old school Motown and soul singers. That was by far the best first date I’ve ever been on and I knew she had me hooked. We were so comfortable with each other. Within a month of dating, we both knew that we were head over heels for each other and we were going to get married.

Fast forward a couple months….We get pregnant with Sofia after only dating 4 months. This is where our tough road begins. People didn’t really know the contents of our relationship because we had only been together for a few months. So it wasn’t your typical “happy times yaaay y’all are having a baby”. There were more people who were concerned and worried rather than excited for us. But it was me and Catie against the world. We always knew that if we stuck together and had each others back we could get through anything. But we had to do a lot of growing to do in our relationship. We had to work through a lot of problems and differences. We ended up coming out the other end as a stronger couple and then our beautiful baby girl was born. Ever since she made her appearance, our relationship has been stronger than ever. Most people think going through pregnancy and the first months of raising a child puts a strain on a relationship. It brought us closer together. We rely on each other. We support each other. We lift each other up when one of us is down. I can honestly say that I’ve never been more confident in a woman having my back or being able to rely on them until Catie came into my life. We’ve learned that we need each other. We are total opposites but we complement each other perfectly. One person excels in something where the other struggles. We make each other better. I knew I needed to be the best person that I could be. This just reinforced the idea of me wanting to marry her. I waited a little while before actually proposing because I needed to make sure our family was financially stable before spending money on a ring. I know I could have gotten something cheap but I wanted her to have the best because that’s what she deserves.

How He Asked

She actually started to worry that I wasn’t going to propose. Which actually helped me with the surprise factor. So now we get to the story of the proposal. Two things I picked up from Catie talking about proposals…don’t be cliche and she wanted to remember whether it be pictures or somebody filming it. We had a trip to Nashville planned and found the perfect place to do it since Catie has this infatuation with bridges. That’s when I started researching photographers in the area. And I immediately knew that Jay Farrell was the man for the job. I wanted somebody the raw, real emotions of two people in love. And I wanted these pictures to be an additional surprise/gift. Jay’s style of photography was perfect and we immediately began corresponding. After a few emails…I was confident he was the perfect person for the job. And we hammered out all the details because I wanted everything to be perfect. We got the place, date, and time. All I had to do was show up and Jay would take care of the rest.

So we get to the big day and we get ready to head to the beautiful pedestrian bridge. Jay and I decided on sunset around 7 because it would make a gorgeous setting and I could use the excuse of we were going to dinner after seeing the bridge. Just something I could use to keep Catie in the dark. So we get in our Uber with plenty of time for us to arrive on time. It should have only taken 5 minutes. After about 15 minutes of driving around and heading in the wrong direction I see the Uber driver throws his hands up looking confused and he says “I don’t know”. It is now 7:15 and the sun is starting to go down. I begin to get flustered, worried, and angry that this Uber driver is going to ruin all these plans. I begin to get angry with the driver which didn’t help the situation. As usual with our relationship, the other person steps up and Catie is the one who gets us to our destination. However, there is one problem. The driver has dropped us off on the wrong side of the bridge from where Jay has a spot picked out and was waiting for us. I text Jay letting him know what had been going on because we are losing sunlight by the minute. He tells me he’s on the move and will meet us half way. By this point I’m still flustered, frazzled, and angry. I’m half outta breath from being nervous and hustling down the bridge and starting to sweat. The whole time Catie is being amazing and trying to cheer me up without even knowing why I’m so upset. As usual, she’s always picking me up. In the distance I see Jay and I know this is our spot. We start walking up and Catie immediately points to Jay and says, “I wonder if they guy will take our picture?” Of course. Of all people, she points out the one guy she’s not supposed to notice. So I tell her not to bother him because he looks busy and I take her with me out onto the overlook point.

Once we get out there…more trouble. I see two other couples who I’m pretty sure are there for the same reason I’m there. I had this plan to make small talk and take some selfies with her to lead up to the proposal. But to be honest, I was still rattled from everything that lead up to this. I couldn’t think of anything to say. At the same time I’m thinking, there’s no way in hell I’m letting one of these other couples steal our shining moment and mess things up even more. So due to being rattled, flustered, and worried some other couple would steal our thunder….there was no build up. I immediately drop to a knee and pull out the box and ring. The look of shock, amazement, and pure joy on her face made me forget about everything else. But if you were to give me a million dollars right now for me to tell you what I said to her in that moment…I couldn’t do it. I have absolutely no clue what I said to her. I just remember being nervous, stuttering, mumbling, and trying to find the words. But what’s so amazing is that I didn’t need the right words. She understood everything I was trying to get across to her. I’ve never felt so loved in my life. Her reaction reassured me this woman was going to love me unconditionally. We had some pretty emotional and passionate moments after I put that ring on her finger for the first time. Jay was the Jedi master and captured those moments better than I could have ever imagined. Catie had no clue until I introduced them.

Looking back and reflecting on that 45 minutes of chaos. I honestly believed that everything went horribly wrong and nothing went the way I wanted it to go. Take into account our Uber driver got us lost, caused us to be late, put us in the wrong spot, we prob ruined one couple’s proposal (Sorry to whoever that was), couldn’t think of the right words to say, and definitely sounded like a stuttering idiot. I truly believed I did terrible and totally botched the entire proposal. But to Catie, she thought it was a dream come true and more than she ever imagined. And that’s the only thing that was important to me. But I have to thank Jay especially for coming to the rescue like a true professional. On the fly, this guy ran down the bridge and finds a new spot for us and managed to get the shots without catie having a clue. I hadn’t even seen the final result and I was still so impressed by his dedication to his clients. He went above and beyond and I couldn’t thank him enough that night. But then a couple days later we are blown away by the results when Jay sends us the gallery of our pictures. These pictures were exactly what I was hoping for. The true raw emotion is breathtaking. Catie years up every time she looks at them. There are two main reasons why I love these pictures so much. First of all, now the whole world truly gets to see the depths of our relationship. Everyone gets to see how passionate, devoted, and truly crazy in love we are with each other.

The whole time we’ve been together, people doubted or didn’t know what to think of our relationship. The pictures that Jay took, clears up any of that doubt. The whole world can look at those pictures and see two people who are madly in love with one another and without a doubt belong together. Now the real reason these pictures are so important to me. I hired Jay to take these pictures for Catie, definitely not for me. I hate taking pictures. But because of Jay’s approach and talent, I can look at Catie’s face and it gives me the chills and makes my heart flutter. I can forever look at these pictures and see just how much this woman is completely in love with me, as I am with her. I can forever look at these pictures and be reminded that I’m the luckiest guy in the world who found the love of his life. I feel like I’m the lucky one that these pictures were taken. All thanks to the decision to hire Jay Farrell and I can’t thank him enough.